Enthusiasts Blogging Our Favorite Classifieds
The Mercedes-Benz W140 Coupe is growing on me. Especially when they are done as well as today’s car. This 1997 S500 Coupe up for sale in Costa Mesa is painted in the ultra-bright Imperial Red and most importantly, the 18″ three-piece AMG wheels. The interior is take it or leave it beige leather, but it does make up for it having just a little over 25,000 miles. Time to buy in on the C140? Probably not this example given the asking price. Let me explain.
A few weeks ago I took a look at a 1993 Mercedes-Benz 500SEC that needed some help to say the least. Thankfully it looks like it sold a few days ago for a low sum of $4,600 and maybe is on its way to a new life. Honestly, I wouldn’t bet on it given how expensive it would be to refurbish the car. Today, I’d thought I’d look at another C140 that looks like it doesn’t need much, if anything at all. This CL500 up for sale in the Los Angeles area is a rare 1999 model, the last year the C140 was in production. Mercedes really cut back on the C140 for the 1999 model year – production was just under 1,500 for the entire world. Word is, only around 125 of them made it to the U.S. in both CL500 and CL600 guise. Needless to say, a rare bird. The good news is this example has just over 100,000 miles on it and looks like it has about half of that. The better news, it isn’t as expensive as you might of thought.
Update 8/18/19 – this 500SEC sold for $4,600.
I still get wishy-washy on the Mercedes-Benz W140 Coupe. Sometimes I think it looks great, other times I think it looks very odd. Yes, a lot of that has to do with the wheel and tire combo, but maybe my argument is that it shouldn’t come down to what wheels and tires a car has to determine if it looks good or not. The reason this comes up is because I came across a very interesting 1993 500SEC up for sale in Florida for a couple of reasons. First, it is painted in the very rare Nautical Blue Metallic. Second, it only has 98k miles on the odometer. Lastly, it is relatively cheap. Although that is probably for a reason.
I must be getting old, because it seems like every year that passes my tolerance for “project cars” gets smaller and smaller. When I had a bunch of free time, I had no problem messing around for countless hours on one of my cars. Now? Get this job finished as fast as possible and be done with it. Don’t get me wrong, I still love my cars, but they wear my patience thin sometimes. This doesn’t mean I still don’t browse for cheap cars constantly and run across some that might not take all that much to have a decent example for way less than market value. Today’s car, a 1994 Mercedes-Benz SL500 up for sale in California, might be that. Looking at the price, I thought it was going to be a total basket case that didn’t run or looked like a nice family of mongooses took up residence in the interior. Much to my surprise, that isn’t the case and this car actually has some extra goodies on it as well.
Continuing on my quest to bring you odd color combinations, I present a 1991 Mercedes-Benz 500SL painted in Impala Brown Metallic with a dark brown top. I’m trying to imagine someone who would walk onto a Mercedes dealer lot in 1991, find the row of R129s, look at all the colors that were offered and say, ”Yes. The brown one. Here is $90,000”. I understand not trying not to stick out or not wanting something flashy, but you shouldn’t be buying a very expensive convertible in the first place if you wanted to blend in with the earth. Yet, someone out there wanted a SL in this color and now they still remain in the garages of retirees to take out for a drive on a nice day. This example up for sale outside of Philadelphia seems to be exactly that. Owned by the same person for the past 18 years but now ready for a new home. Thing is, you aren’t getting a deal on the drab color. At least not this one.
